Arizona immigration law: Changes sought by lawmakers

by Alia Beard Rau - Apr. 29, 2010 08:11 PMThe Arizona Republic

The Arizona House approved several new changes to Arizona's new immigration law. The changes still need final approval from the Senate before being passed along to the governor. If Gov. Jan Brewer supports them, they would go into effect at the same time the new law would.

The phrase "lawful contact" would be changed to "lawful stop, detention or arrest" to clarify that an officer would not need to question a crime victim or witness about their legal status.

The word "solely" would be eliminated from the sentence "A law enforcement official or agency … may not solely consider race, color or national origin" in establishing reasonable suspicion that someone is in the country illegally.

Bill sponsor Sen. Russell Pearce, R-Mesa, said the intent is to clarify that "this bill prohibits racial profiling in any form." Bill opponents had argued that the word "solely" allowed officers to base their reasonable suspicion on race and color as long as it wasn't just one of them.

Rep. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Phoenix, said those two changes help clarify the bill, and lighten its impact somewhat. But she called a third change "frightening."

That change clarifies that a police officer responding to city ordinance violations would also be required to determine the immigration status of an individual they have reasonable suspicion of being in the country illegally. City ordinance violations vary by municipality but could include things like loud parties, barking dogs, cars on blocks in the yard or too many renters.

Bill supporters say the addition of the word "ordinance" does not change anything because under the signed law, officers could question the legal status of anyone they come into lawful contact with, whether that lawful contact related to a law or an ordinance.

Other bills

Among the dozens of bills awaiting Gov. Jan Brewer's action are several that didn't pass until the final hours of the legislative session. Most of these provoked controversy or needed last-minute fixes to get through. They include:

• Senate Bill 1307, which bans human-animal hybrids. It won narrow approval in both chambers of the Legislature this week. Opponents ridiculed its attempt to legislate actions that they say have no foundation in reality, with Democrats cracking jokes about minotaurs and mermaids.

But proponents, such as Cathi Herrod of the Center for Arizona Policy, said there is evidence that such activities have been happening in Europe, and they want to prevent that from coming to Arizona.

• Senate Bill 1254, which provides tax credits for companies that produce electricity from renewable energy. Senators killed it during a debate on the merits of targeted tax incentives, but revived it hours later.

• Senate Bill 2143, continues the state Department of Liquor Licenses and Control for another five years and extends the hours of liquor sales on Sundays. If signed, liquor sales could start at 6 a.m., the same time as the other days of the week, instead of the current 10 a.m.

• House Bill 1045 continues SCF, a quasi-governmental agency that provides workers' compensation insurance to more than 30,000 businesses, for another two years. It also creates a road map for the agency to convert into a mutual-insurance company that would be an entirely private entity, governed by a private board. That private company must be operating by January 2013.